How much does it cost to pay attention?

R and I stayed home to take care of mountains of work (which I am currently hiding from hoping it will somehow dissapate while I play) while S, K and hubby went to Omaha so K could try out for American Idol. It's also a mini-vacation for them all and I am glad they are enjoying the company of friends out there.

R and I were talking about politeness and how you should pay attention to your hosts and hostesses so that you don't intentionally give offense to them. But R wasn't paying close attention, and asked, "How much does it cost to pay attention?" :grin:

I told her it doesn't "cost" anything except our time and focusing on what people are saying and doing, like when I tell her to listen in church.

Our elderly neighbor called late this morning. She was quite agitated and immediately went into a tirade about a phone call she received late last night that she supposed was from one of my older daughters. The caller had told her to turn her TV off, close her window and go to sleep. The caller also chided her for watching whatever was on the TV. Our neighbor when on for about 4 minutes before I shouted over her to tell her that our girls were in another state! This took a while to sink in and our neighbor was telling me she didn't want trouble with her neighbors and it couldn't be the neighbors on the other side because she's never had trouble with them.

Until this neighbor called, we did not have her phone number. I suppose we could have looked it up in the phone book, but we haven't needed to so far. Our very limited contact with her came in the form of checking on her after the blizzard last October and subsequent heavy snowfalls for which my hubby shoveled for her. The girls also brought her some home-baked goodies at Christmastide.

She repeated herself several times and after finding out that I agreed with her that she should be able to watch whatever she wants on the TV as well as keep her window open, she apologized and invited me over for coffee.

Proving again, that it just takes time and focus to *pay attention.*